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It’s no surprise that the population of Texas continues to grow rapidly. This expanding population increases the demand for power and electricity, which causes more strain on Texas’ existing power grid. Improving power grid reliability and efficiency was a central topic recently at the 2013 Austin Electricity Conference, held at The University of Texas.

The McCombs School of Business’ Energy Management and Innovation Center (EMIC) hosted the third annual Austin Electricity Conference, which was organized together with faculty from the Cockrell School of Engineering, the LBJ School of Public Affairs, the School of Law and UT’s Energy Institute. Conference participants included energy company representatives, educators, former and current regulators and other energy industry stakeholders.

Throughout several sessions and panel discussions during the two-day conference, a wide range of ideas was shared including demand-response programs, technology improvements, incentives for power conservation, reevaluating costs and market value of electricity, and collecting more detailed research on consumer energy habits.

Similar topics are also presented throughout the year in Texas Executive Education’s Energy Certificate Programs, which are led by the same top-tier faculty members from McCombs School of Business and UT’s leading Energy initiatives. Our next Energy Certificate course will be held in September in Houston.

In the Financial Times’ latest ranking of executive education open enrollment programs, Texas Executive Education placed 3rd among U.S. public universities, and 13th in the nation overall. This ranking for McCombs School of Business becomes even more significant when one considers that a large majority of the programs in the survey are located outside the U.S. In fact, there are only three other U.S. public universities in this year’s Financial Times list: Michigan (Ross), Virginia (Darden), and UC-Berkeley (Haas).

Being the first year that Texas Executive Education’s open enrollment programs were evaluated in the survey, it was a very strong showing and it speaks volumes for the exceptional quality of instruction and interaction provided by McCombs faculty. Texas Executive Education’s custom programs, which are also led by top-ranked McCombs and UT faculty, have been ranked high in the Financial Times list for seven straight years now, placing 5th among U.S. public universities in the most recent results.

McCombs School of Business Associate Professor Ed Anderson teaches that “innovation” is more than just a stream of new ideas. Innovation is the result of a system of interactions and processes within an organization that creates new or better value for customers by solving problems or meeting needs. With this mindset, innovation—or more specifically, innovative thinking—is actually a vital part in all areas of business, from product development to marketing to management of change and even team collaboration.

In many MBA courses, McCombs faculty members have begun incorporating strategies and skills to help professionals and students develop more innovative thinking. These professors include Dr. Luis Martins, Dr. Ethan Burris and Dr. Violina Rindova, who all facilitate innovation-focused programs in Texas Executive Education’s Driving Business Innovation Certificate.

A main objective of our Innovation certificate aligns with this focus at McCombs—to equip business leaders with tools to develop more innovative thinking across all disciplines of their organization or team.

Learn more about our Driving Business Innovation Certificate, and contact us with any questions or to register for an upcoming program.

Chris Scott, co-founder and CEO of Scott + Reid General Contractors, and Shawn Peterson, founder and CEO of United Graphics, told DBJ that the knowledge gained from The University of Texas’ business school was instrumental in helping them successfully launch and direct their own companies.

Not surprisingly, the McCombs School of Business was recently named one of the Top Schools for Entrepreneurship in Businessweek’s latest ranking of MBA programs.

The McCombs School of Business at The University of Texas at Austin has just been named one of the Top Schools for Entrepreneurship in Businessweek’s latest ranking of MBA programs, released this past Monday. Making the list at #10 world-wide, we join the ranks of other renowned business schools like Stanford, MIT, UC-Berkeley and Carnegie Mellon. See the full top 10 list here (courtesy of Austin Business Journal).

“For decades, value creation through innovation and entrepreneurship has been a dominant and consistent focus of the McCombs School of Business,” said Thomas W. Gilligan, Dean of the McCombs School of Business. “The international reputation in entrepreneurial studies that McCombs has had for years will only keep growing as we continue to foster innovation and new business creation.”